The beginning of the year 1946 finds the United States strong and deservedly confident.  We have a record of enormous achievements as a democratic society in solving problems and meeting opportunities as they developed.  We find ourselves possessed of immeasurable advantages—­vast and varied natural resources; great plants, institutions, and other facilities; unsurpassed technological and managerial skills; an alert, resourceful, and able citizenry.  We have in the United States Government rich resources in information, perspective, and facilities for doing whatever may be found necessary to do in giving support and form to the widespread and diversified efforts of all our people.

And for the immediate future the business prospects are generally so favorable that there is danger of such feverish and opportunistic activity that our grave postwar problems may be neglected.  We need to act now with full regard for pitfalls; we need to act with foresight and balance.  We should not be lulled by the immediate alluring prospects into forgetting the fundamental complexity of modern affairs, the catastrophe that can come in this complexity, or the values that can be wrested from it.

But the long-range difficulties we face should no more lead to despair than our immediate business prospects should lead to the optimism which comes from the present short-range prospect.  On the foundation of our victory we can build a lasting peace, with greater freedom and security for mankind in our country and throughout the world.  We will more certainly do this if we are constantly aware of the fact that we face crucial issues and prepare now to meet them.

To achieve success will require both boldness in setting our sights and caution in steering our way on an uncharted course.  But we have no luxury of choice.  We must move ahead.  No return to the past is possible.

Our Nation has always been a land of great opportunities for those people of the world who sought to become part of us.  Now we have become a land of great responsibilities to all the people of all the world.  We must squarely recognize and face the fact of those responsibilities.  Advances in science, in communication, in transportation, have compressed the world into a community.  The economic and political health of each member of the world community bears directly on the economic and political health of each other member.

The evolution of centuries has brought us to a new era in world history in which manifold relationships between nations must be formalized and developed in new and intricate ways.

The United Nations Organization now being established represents a minimum essential beginning.  It must be developed rapidly and steadily.  Its work must be amplified to fill in the whole pattern that has been outlined.  Economic collaboration, for example, already charted, now must be carried on as carefully and as comprehensively as the political and security measures.